Thursday, July 6, 2017

ILGCN RAINBOW CULTURE CONFERENCE TAKES PLACE IN BUDAPEST

Press release from the ILGCN Information Secretariat: July 5, 2017

Budapest -- Seminars on LGBT culture and history, films, music, poetry, art and photography were part of the ILGCN (international rainbow culture network) international cultural conference -- July 3-4, 2017 part of this year-s Budapest Pride.

Also discussions on the role of "Bears on the Barricades," the role of trans persons in rainbow history and culture, immigrants/refugee contributions to LGBT culture, the importance of rainbow humanists and the anti-fascist movement on the rainbow barricades -- especially in nations facing growing threats from violent neo-nazis, intolerant politicans, negative media and homophobic religious leaders. Discussions also covered research in the Nazi and neo Nazi persecution of homosexuals -- followed 10 years after the liberation of Auschwitz by Franco's Tefía concentration camp in Spain, and the growing number of LGBT monuments paying tribute to LGBT people arrested, imprisoned, and murdered over the millinnems.

Art and photography illustrated the works of colleagues from Poland, Belarus, Russia, Estonia, Finland and elsewhere. Films included the Canadian "Beyond Pride" covering prides in Vancouver, Sri Lanka, Brazil and Russia and the British drama "Unchechen" displaying the recent wave of persecution and violance against gays in the Chechnyan republic of Russia.

Participants requested another such conference in the Hungarian capital next year. The 2nd stage of this year's conference is planned for one of the 14 Nordic cities of the 2nd Nordic Rainbow History & Art Month this October -- an event inspired by the LGBT history months taking place in London for over a decade and the LGBT history month in Budapest.

The Budapest conference was also supported by Tupilak(Nordic rainbow culture workers), European Rainbow Humanists and Bears International.

Some of the Budapest conference participants from Canada, Hungary and Sweden